


The Pianist

by RitsuTonks



Category: Sekai-ichi Hatsukoi
Genre: Character Death, Depression, Grief/Mourning, LGBTQ Character, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Teacher!Kisa, m/m - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-11
Updated: 2019-03-10
Packaged: 2019-11-15 03:57:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18066167
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RitsuTonks/pseuds/RitsuTonks
Summary: Kisa, a thirty-year-old university professor, is trying his hardest to forget this brunet boy who had broken his hear ten years ago. One day, he hears a melodic piano song, exactly the same that was played by his ex on the day they broke up, and that is where everything starts to blossom between him and Yukina Kou.





	1. Prologue & Chapter One - Yukina Kou

**Author's Note:**

> Hi!
> 
> This story is currently being rewritten. I found the old piece childish, and too simple.   
> Also, the old piece is only on fanfiction.net. I'm publishing this one here as well. Let's see how it works out. (: 
> 
> Please read the additional tags carefully, and read for your own responsibility. 
> 
> The rating and the archive warning might change during the story. 
> 
> Also, you might have not read my bio which says English is not my first language, so please forgive me for any grammar mistakes. :D

**Prologue**

 

Almost like in those hyped, famous shoujo anime series, the sun was shining bright and the gentle breeze made the curtains fly when Kisa stepped into the house. He was following something – a melodic piano music that made his heart race fast and his face go red. He loved this song. It was slow, but not the sad kind of slow. Cheerful, you could almost dance to it.

Whenever he asked Yoshida Ryou what this song was, he would never tell. He would always just smile and it always made Kisa forget what he wanted to know. He just enjoyed the music without the chance of knowing what it was so he could maybe download it and listen to it wherever he is when he’s without Yoshida.

When he finally reached the room, he stopped, his smile grew wider. He couldn’t take his eyes off of the brunet boy playing that piano. It felt magical, as if it wasn’t even real. Kisa leaned against the opened door and watched Yoshida playing. His eyes were closed, no emotion showed on his face. Anyone who watched him like Kisa did now would know he was only physically in the room – otherwise he was in a state of mind that Kisa didn’t really understand. He was somewhere else as he played.

“Look, who stopped by,” he suddenly said without missing a key on the keyboard.

“Come on, why would I not stop by?” Kisa chuckled.

Yoshida now stopped playing, and the sudden pause made the melodic, peaceful music end in a very grotesque way.

“Listen… I need to tell you something,” Yoshida said now, biting his bottom lip as he turned to Kisa with this serious face.

“Oh, shit,” Kisa muttered. His heart which was beating so fast from happiness and excitement now felt like it skipped a beat.

“Kisa, I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

A moment of silence. Yoshida seemed to search the words to express his thoughts and feelings, and Kisa wanted to run away now. He wasn’t entirely sure he wanted to hear it. But he waited patiently.

“I came to realise that the things between us…”

“…just aren’t gonna work,” Kisa finished the sentence. “How did you come to this conclusion after three years?”

“I–“

“You know, what? Save it.” Kisa was fighting hard against his tears. “Thanks for the past few years, Yoshida. I appreciate everything you did for me.”

He said that without any sarcasm. He left the room without a final goodbye, and just run and run until he was far enough from that house. The sun that was shining so bright now was hidden by storm clouds, and soon enough, it got colder and started raining.

And Kisa was sitting on a bench in an abandoned park, trying to figure out where the things could have gone wrong.

And after of getting soaking wet from the rain and crying his eyes out, he understood it.

He got his heart broken because he had chosen the wrong person. Again.

 

* * *

 

 

**Chapter One – Yukina Kou**

 

Silence. Peaceful silence filled the classroom as people were working on their tests. It was almost mid-term, the end of autumn, and whenever Kisa looked up at his students, all he had seen were tired, sleepy eyes and faces. Even he was thanking god that it was the last class today. Getting tests ready for different classes and different years was just exhausting – probably as exhausting as, for the students, getting ready for these tests.

He turned back to his papers and textbooks, correcting tests of other classes.

“I’m done, professor,” someone said, and Kisa slowly turned his gaze up to meet this brunet student. Yukina Kou, that was his name. Well, Kisa wasn’t sure about that. Memorising hundreds of names made him confuse one student with another.

“That was fast,” Kisa breathed. He didn’t want to be too loud.

“I hope I didn’t screw up, though,” the boy said, shrugging. “Can I?”

“Oh, yeah, you can leave.”

Yukina Kou smiled and left the classroom. Kisa sighed. Soon, more people handed in their tests, and in a little bit more than thirty minutes, everyone was out of the classroom, except Kisa. He grabbed all the tests, counted them one more time to see if everyone turned theirs in, and only after that did he leave the room.

The corridor wasn’t as noisy as it always was in the daytime. The setting sun painted everything orange and purplish, even the corridor. Kisa hurried back to the office and started correcting the tests. He had to give them back by next week, and there students of five classes had already done their tests, and there was one more to go.

“Why are you still here?”

Looking up, his eyes met the glance of the vice dean, Yokozawa-sensei, and the dean himself, Miyagi.

“I’m correcting test, Yokozawa-sensei,” Kisa replied tiredly.

“Are you well prepared, though?” Yokozawa asked now.

Yokozawa Takafumi, in Kisa’s opinion, was irritating. He always tried to show how much better he was and that he’d always done his work right in time. It’s not like Kisa had ever ran out of time when it came to his work. But somehow, Yokozawa did everything faster, and he always found a way to shove it in Kisa’s face. Why? Because he was the vice dean.

On the other hand, Miyagi liked him. Kisa didn’t know why. Probably because of his incredible work.

“Just leave him alone,” the dean rolled his eyes. “What’s the point in arguing if he does everything on time?”

“I’m just making sure nothing goes wrong, that’s all,” Yokozawa replies in this deep tone.

Kisa sighed and put all his stuff in his bag.

“I’ll be leaving now,” he said as he put on his scarf and winter coat. “See you tomorrow.”

“It’s Saturday tomorrow,” Miyagi-sensei said and Kisa turned around with a frown.

“It’s not?”

“It’s Friday, Miyagi,” Yokozawa cuts in, and Kisa couldn’t help but notice that Yokozawa-sensei didn’t use any honorifics. Were they this close? Well, Kisa didn’t really have the time to mind that. He waved and left the office to the deserted corridor.

As he left the huge building of the university, the cold breeze felt painful against his face. He took a shaky breath and walked to the bus stop. It was crowded as usual, young students were probably on their way out to drink and party. Kisa had never had that. When he was their age, he focused on his degree to be a teacher which he desperately wanted to be. He never gone out to party and drink himself to death.

Well, he had gone out a few times to gay bars and hooked up with different guys that were the closest to him and looked decent. He would let them buy some drink, and in less than an hour, he would be making out with them, and in another hour, they were all in his bed. That was how he spent his twenties.

After that certain day…

He sighed as he pressed the stop button, and as soon as the bus stopped he got off, massaging his temples. Again. He thought about Yoshida again. For ten years, he had been trying his best to hide the memories of that brunet boy, tried to forget him and get over him, but he failed. Every single time, he failed.

The little apartment he lived in was so silent that it was sometimes physically painful. Kisa still remembered the days he had brought Yoshida up to this apartment, drinking wine on hot summer days and hot chocolate on cold winter nights.

And every time he couldn’t help but remember him, his heart clenched. He felt the urge to hit the wall right now. He just wanted to get rid of these memories somehow, in some way, but he couldn’t. The feeling of not being good enough for someone who meant the world to him was just too much to forget. Even after ten years.

He took a quick shower and continued his work until midnight. It turned his mind off and he only concentrated on the tests. The exhaustion made him fall asleep right after he finished correcting the tests.

And he dreamed. As he always did almost every single night since the breakup. It was exhausting to wake up every night, choking on tears, feeling unbearably lonely without Yoshida. There was a short period of time when Kisa could have sworn he had been over it. But he had to admit that he wasn’t. No matter how long it had been, no matter how many people he had been with, he just couldn’t completely erased the memories and the pain Yoshida left.

And the worst part was that he had never found out why Yoshida broke up with him ten years ago. And it was still haunting him to this day.

His heart was beating fast in his chest as he reached for the glass of water he left on the night stand before sleep. He hated this. He hated that he wasn’t over Yoshida, he hated that he was left behind without answers, and he hated that no one on this Earth was able to make him forget that boy.

Damn.

 

* * *

 

One hell of a day. That’s how Fridays feel. At least for Kisa. The last school day on the week, and it felt the longest of all. One class after another, one group of thirty or forty people after another. And some of those classes had only just written their tests.

Kisa sighed. At least in his last class he didn’t have to think about the tests. Damn mid-term.

He walked in, put his stuff down, read the names, then told them where to open the book and what to do. The class worked in silence while he checked if everything was going alright.

He taught English. Some students walked up to him, asking question about grammar and spelling. And every time, Kisa would explain everything all over again patiently. And then this boy came. Yukina Kou.

“I’m sorry, I just feel like something’s not right,” he said as he reached Kisa’s table. Kisa looked up at him, and his heart pounded.

Damn this guy.

His face just reminded him of Yoshida…

He swallowed down his feelings as he pulled Yukina’s notebook closer to read.

“It’s all okay,” Kisa frowned. “Why did you think it wasn’t?”

“I mean this sentence just felt like I used Japanese word order instead of English, and...” Yukina now pointed at said sentence, and his finger touched the skin on Kisa’s hand.

"There’s no problem with that sentence,” Kisa managed to say, pulling his hand away from Yukina’s. “It’s perfect. Well done.”

Yukina grinned and said a quick thank you as he hurried back to his seat. On the other hand, Kisa couldn’t even smile. Maybe it was just his imagination playing tricks with him, but for that moment, Kisa honestly thought it was Yoshida standing right in front of him. Well it wasn’t possible anyway. He’s thirty as well as Kisa is, he wouldn’t be in a university.

Finally, the class was over, and Kisa went to the office to grab his stuff, and was ready to leave the school, but something hit him.

And it hit him hard. Right in the stomach.

From the distance, he could hear music. Piano music. It was possibly coming from the music room, and before he could think about what he was doing, he rushed towards that certain room. He ran as fast as he could to reach the music, the music that was playing on the day Yoshida left him.

And just a moment later, he barged into the music room, and that was when he actually thought about what he was doing.

He was running around the corridor which is forbidden. He was running, although he was a thirty-year-old professor.

He opened his mouth to shout the name, to shout his name, but the one who suddenly stopped playing and turned around wasn’t Yoshida.

It was Yukina Kou.

“Sensei?” he said slowly with his head tilted to the side. He must have been confused that a professor just barged into the music room.

“Yukina-san...” Kisa breathed. His heart just wasn’t going to stop racing. “You should be home by now. Why are you still here?”

“Probably for the same reason you barged in.” He laughed at his own joke. Well, Kisa assumed it was a joke. “Okay, well, I play the piano almost every Friday. I just love this thing. It calms my nerves and helps me study later. I mean, it totally helps me focus.”

“Uh-huh...” Kisa slowly nodded. Although the things Yukina said stuck in his head. That was exactly what Yoshida said when they started dating. That was the same reason he played the piano. What the hell?

“Everything okay, professor?” Yukina asked now, his eyes narrowed. “I don’t mean to be rude or anything, but I’ve never experienced such a thing. I mean, a prof barging into any classrooms.”

Yukina laughed softly, and Kisa didn’t really know what to say.

“I didn’t mean to barge in, I was just, you know, checking who it was,” Kisa ended up saying.

“Well, that makes sense.”

Yukina threw a grin, then reached for his coat and bag.

“That’s right, go home, you should be on your way home,” Kisa said, forcing a smile.

“I’m twenty-one, professor, I can take care of myself,” Yukina chuckled. “It’s not gonna hurt if I stay a little after class to play piano.”

“Not, it won’t, but if you disappear on your way home we’ll be the first ones to be suspicious, so be careful!”

Yukina laughed loudly, and even Kisa smiled as well. All the things he said to Yukina was just made up to cover his silly act. But yet, Kisa felt like these words were true.

And he felt like he had to take care of this kid.

Just because he looked like Yoshida.


	2. Chapter 2 - Closer

**Chapter 2 – Closer**

 

When Kisa arrived at work on Monday, he found Yokozawa with a stranger guy in the office. The guy was standing in front of the desk, looking at the vice dean with those emotionless eyes, standing Yokozawa’s strict look with perfect calmness. Kisa found that quite brave.

“Kisa, glad you came just now,” Yokozawa spoke to him now. “This is the new psychologist, Takano Masamune.”

Kisa bowed in front of the man.

“Nice to meet you.”

“You too,” Takano smiled and turned back to Yokozawa.

“You start from tomorrow. We have a few students that might need help. As I’ve already said, that’s the reason I’ve decided to hire a psychologist.”

Takano turned back to Kisa now and smiled.

“Sounds like you’re telling it to him rather than me.”

“That makes sense, though,” Kisa added as he sat down at his table, pulling books and papers out of his bag. “Mid-terms are a pain in the ass. Those kids need reassurance that they’re doing okay. And they don’t just need these reassurances from well-done tests.”

Yokozawa nodded in agreement.

“Well, I’ll do my best from tomorrow,” Takano said, his voice was kind of toneless to Kisa. He had this weird poker face as well. For a moment, Kisa could have questioned Yokozawa’s instincts about this guy.

Besides, Takano looked extremely young.

After Takano left, silence filled the office room. Kisa was getting ready for classes. He managed to correct all the tests on the weekend. He hardly even slept, which was for the better now. Especially because his bruises from the past had been renewed because of that certain brunet student of his. And only his work could make him stop thinking.

He collected his notes for his first class and got up from his seat with a sigh.

“How old is he anyway?” he suddenly asked, and Yokozawa looked at him confused.

“You mean Takano?”

“Yeah.”

“Twenty-eight,” Yokozawa said. “Not much younger than you.”

“Are you kidding?” Kisa frowned. “He looks less than that.”

“Well, you should be going to your class, shouldn’t you?”

Kisa sighed, and turned around, rolling his eyes. He left the office without a word, and walked past by some students in the corridor to reach the classroom.

Sometimes he wanted to think that teaching English was just a horrible nightmare. Not because he didn’t like teaching, but because he had some really dumb students. And sometimes, he still needed to explain basic grammar rules to students in third-year – and students right before graduation. Being a teacher wasn’t easy, he kind of expected it when he applied to the right university back when he was still a student himself.

But going back to lessons that should be taught in elementary school was pretty exhausting.

He walked back to the office after class to get the right notes to his next class, just to bump into a very tired and worn out Miyagi professor. The dean was sitting in his chair with a cigarette in his mouth. Sometimes Kisa wondered how it was okay for him to smoke between the walls of the university, but he never questioned it anyway.

“Kisa...”

“Yes?”

“Are you okay with taking 2-B in eight period?”

This day, Kisa was supposed to have only seven classes. And none with 2-B.

“Why? What happened?”

“Well, Yukimura-sensei has a flu or fever or god knows...” Miyagi sighed as he exhaled a big cloud of smoke, “So she’s away for a while. Only Kitamura and you are the only English professors right now. Too many classes and Kitamura has his own plus half of Yukimura’s. Please.”

“Well, I guess it can’t be helped,” Kisa sighed. “2-B, you said?”

“Yup...”

Kisa reached for his drawer to pull out notes and books, and checked what lesson this class was at. Then he stood up and left the office to his next class.

And in the middle of the deserted corridor, he just realised which class 2-B actually was.

It was the class Yukina was in.

 

* * *

 

During the last period, the classroom was silent as everybody was busy with taking notes after Kisa gave a long presentation about the origins of English language. He was sitting in his chair with the book opened in his hands, going through some lessons. Just so he wouldn’t look at a certain someone. Because during his presentation, he would glance at the whole branch just so he had an excuse to glance at _Yukina_.

He clenched his teeth as he looked up at the class again. Then he turned back to the book. And his thoughts wandered to the past again. He remembered when Yoshida would struggle with English, his biggest issue was with the word order, and Kisa would happily help him out – in a park, after school or on the phone in the middle of the night as Yoshida was getting ready for tests.

And when he was about to become a teacher and had to choose his majority, he had chosen subconsciously. And years later did he just realised that the roots of his love of lecturing and teaching people English gone back to Yoshida.

Weird enough that ten years later he was teaching a student that could have been an identical twin to his ex-lover.

When the class finally ended – and it felt such a damn long class –, some students walked up to him. Kisa was looking at them, waiting for question or anything they wanted to say. The students looked at each other first, then turned back to Kisa.

“We were kind of wondering if you want to have a drink with us this weekend?”

Kisa frowned, then burst out laughing.

“Going out to drink with my students would cost my job, you know.”

Some of the students laughed with him, some just looked pretty disappointed.

“That’s a loss,” a girl said, tucking her sweatshirt. “You’re far the coolest prof here.”

Kisa slightly blushed, still grinning.

“Come on...”

“Well, worth a shot,” someone else said, and they started to wander out of the classroom. Until only one stayed.

“Oi, Kou, stop standing ‘round!”

Kisa’s gaze now wandered at Yukina who was still standing right in front of him, smiling.

“I’ll catch up,” he said, and the others didn’t say a thing, just left. And now it was just him and Kisa in the classroom.

Kisa tried his hardest to look at him without blushing or shaking.

“Everything okay?”

“Yeah, I was just wondering how my test turned out one hundred percent.”

Kisa got so surprised his brows almost reached the top of his forehead as he raised them.

“You almost always get one hundred percent. Guess it’s because you’re studying hard.”

“Yeah, but no...”

“Are you agreeing or disagreeing right now?”

They both burst out laughing and for a moment, Kisa just forgot who he was talking to. Yukina shrugged and looked him in the eyes.

“Well, I was pretty sure I’d hardly reach fifty percent. For some reason, I don’t get the whole thing at all, but on the other hand… I do get it.”

Kisa nodded.

“I know the struggle, I used to be like that. But I had to memorise every single grammar rule in order to become a teacher, so… And if you guys get it and you write tests that reach eighty, ninety or onehundred percent, then I think I managed to get over this struggle, and you will, too.”

“Awww!” Yukina said with a bright smile, and the first thing that popped into Kisa’s mind was that the boy was literally sparkling. “That’s so nice of you!”

“I mean...” Kisa scratched his head with an awkward smile, “I’m your professor after all. My job is kind of to support all of you.”

Yukina groaned as he walked towards the door. Kisa walked behind him.

“Professor Yokozawa should learn,” he said quietly.

“Oi, stop talking about him behind his back,” Kisa replied with a small smile. “I’m gonna get sued if he hears us, not you.”

Yukina laughed so loud it echoed in the corridor.

“Gotcha!”

“Hey, what’s up with that ‘gotcha?’ Show some respect, I’m your professor after all!”

“Alright, sorry!” Yukina said as he clapped his hands together and bowed apologetically. “See you tomorrow!”

Kisa shook his head with a smile as he watched Yukina leaving, probably catching up to his friends. Then he sighed as he went back to his office to pack his stuff and leave.

He had noticed that he had been spacing out a lot lately. Mainly because of Yukina. Kisa had never completely forgotten about Yoshida, but he surely hadn’t thought about him as much as he did in the past few days. Everything Yukina did, every conversation they had was a reminder of Yoshida.

And when would he break out of this one hell of a circle? Maybe he’d be the first one to show up in front of Takano’s office tomorrow.

He smiled to this thought as he left the university.

He was an adult and a professor, he didn’t need a damn psychologist.

 

* * *

 

On his way home, Kisa decided to pop into a nearby bookstore. Once in a while, he’d buy a book or two, just so they can sit on his shelves forever. it’s not like he had never read any of the books he’d bought. He just didn’t really have the time to finish them, and if he did, well, that took a very long time.

As he entered the bookstore, an employee greeted him with a smile, and advertised some new releases and newbie authors. Kisa nodded and started walking around the huge shelves. He had no idea what he wanted to read. Crime? Mystery? Fantasy? Historical stuff? He sighed, and reached for a book. And then something caught his eyes – shoujo manga.

He almost laughed out loud to the idea of him reading shoujo. But he headed towards the manga section anyway, checking out the huge collection of mangas. And before he could have thought about it, he was standing in line with four books of a famous manga series. It was about a girl who was dumped after a few years of dating a guy, and she’s trying to get over him. Kisa’s first thought was that it was probably written about him.

“Good afternoon, sir!”

“Good afternoon,” Kisa mumbled as he stepped ahead, still reading the caption of the books. “Just these.”

He looked up and his eyes met the brightly sparkling Yukina Kou.

“Oh, professor!” he shouted in happiness. “Never thought I’d see you here!”

“Holy sh… And I never thought you’d be working here...” Kisa replied with a blush on his face.

“Sooo, shoujo manga, huh?” Yukina started chit-chatting while scanning the books. “Great choice, though.”

“Is it?”

“But still, it’s weird to imagine you reading these,” Yukina laughed, now putting the books into a small bag.

“And you know what?” Kisa reached for the bag. “I’m gonna read them proudly!”

Yukina burst out laughing so loud it echoed, and all the staff members and customers turned towards him. Kisa blushed a little and so did the brunet.

“Well, see you around school I guess,” he then mumbled with a small smile.

Kisa nodded.

“Definitely. Make sure you don’t exhaust yourself, though. Working and studying will drive you crazy.”

“Well, I’m scared now!”

They both smiled, then Kisa left the bookstore. And once again, for a moment, he had forgotten that he was talking to Yukina. His student. His chest was clenching as he held onto the bag tightly, and he felt like he just could breathe the air in.

He shouldn’t be getting this close to Yukina. Ever since Kisa had noticed this boy, he had been remembering, and remembering renewed his wounds from the past. For the past few nights, he’d gone to sleep with aching stomach and chest, heart beating like crazy, his thoughts around Yoshida and the past.

Maybe it would be easier to get over it if he knew why Yoshida had broken up with him in the first place.

Right now, right at that moment, as he was standing at the bus stop, surrounded by a small crowd, Kisa was sure he’s never going to get over it.

As he was going to get on the bus that finally arrived, a woman bumped into him.

“Oh my, I’m so sorry,” Kisa apologised quickly.

“Oh, come on, it’s my fault,” she chuckled a little as she glanced at Kisa. “I wasn’t paying attention. “

Kisa smiled at her as he got on the bus. The woman looked familiar, but Kisa didn’t know who she was. Well, probably the mother of one of his students, or someone he saw in a store before. He sighed as he tried not to fall asleep in the seat.

But he did.

And the woman he bumped into appeared in his dream.


	3. Chapter 3 - Odd Thing

**Chapter 3 – Odd Things**

 

Kisa turned off the projector, and the screen went white. Then he turned to the big crowd of students, one hand in his pocket, one on the table.

“Any questions?”

Distinct chatter was all he heard, but nobody put their hands up or said anything clear.

“Come on, every good question wins.”

“Wins what?” someone asked loud.

“One million yen?” Kisa shrugged with a half-smile. “More knowledge that you can use on finals? Whatever.”

Now a girl in the distance put her hand up, looking quite excited. Kisa picked her.

“Do you have a girlfriend, professor?”

“That’s not a very appropriate question,” Kisa chuckled, his face slightly blushed.

“Of course he’s frickin’ married, girl, shut the hell up!” someone said in the crowd, and the chatter between the students got louder.

Kisa rolled his eyes, sighed, and knocked on the table to get everyone’s attention.

“Silence,” he said quite softly. “Just so everyone’s satisfied and you won’t be rolling around in your bed thinking if I have a girlfriend or I’m married. Neither. Can we move on?”

“If I ask a question about it in English, will you answer?” another girl asked, and once again, Kisa rolled his eyes. On the other hand, the question made people laugh.

“No, I’m not going to talk about this,” Kisa shook his head. “Enough talk. Any questions about any of the poems and poets I’ve shown you just now?”

Everybody went silent. As if they weren’t chatting cheerfully just a minute ago. Kisa could have sworn to god that he hadn’t raised his voice at them. He wasn’t even mad, he just felt… frustrated. Irritated, even. He had never really liked to be asked about his love life. Not after what happened between him and Yoshida.

“If you have no questions, then see you all tomorrow!”

People began to slowly leave the classroom, and Kisa began to pack his stuff, too. From the corner of his eyes, he saw that girl who asked if he had a girlfriend. It was the same girl that invited him to drink out yesterday.

“Everything okay?” Kisa asked her, and her face went all red.

“Professor, I just want to say that I’m sorry,” she mumbled, tugging her sleeves. “I shouldn’t have asked inappropriate questions.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Kisa shook his head with a small smile, hoping it was comforting enough for that girl. He honestly didn’t want to hurt anyone, just tried to avoid the topic. And he definitely never had to comfort anyone once during his career.

“Are you sure?”

She looked so concerned that Kisa almost laughed. She was almost overacting this whole thing. It was just a simple question, Kisa closed the topic, that’s all. Why is she so…concerned now? Kisa sighed and shook his head.

“Yeah. Make sure you go through the previous lessons once again.”

The girl nodded with a smile and left the classroom. A minute later, Kisa left too. He let out a long sigh, and walked back to his office. He didn’t have any class in the next period, so he took a seat at his table, stretched, and for a few minutes, he did nothing but spacing out.

“Good morning,” a sharp voice said, and it suddenly dragged Kisa back to reality. In fact, he almost jumped out of his seat.

“Oh, for god’s sake, you scared me!”

Takano laughed softly, and smiled a little, and somehow, it didn’t fit in the picture Kisa had about him in his head. He thought he’d be a forever poker face.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to.”

Takano sat down to one of the tables, writing something in a thick and quite creased notebook. Kisa watched him for a while. During his university years, he had taken psychology classes, learning about basic psychology, how to treat students, how to handle different situations, and people with different skills. And he was sure Takano learned way more than that. Because what Kisa had learned was only the surface.

And despise he had taken these classes, he couldn’t cope with his past properly.

He sighed. Here we go again, he thought. The past.

“How’s your first day going?” he asked Takano to avoid thinking.

The man looked up, thought for a second, then nodded.

“Quiet. Only one person sought help so far. I don’t mean to complain. Hopefully, it means that the others are in a good mental state.”

Kisa nodded in agreement.

“Yeah. That’s good.”

But he knew. They both knew, that some of them probably need help and they just can’t find the courage to seek it. And it made Kisa quite sad. He knew that people who need help should seek it. For the sake of themselves.

“So then why did I not seek help?” he mumbled under his breath, and Takano looked up with a small frown.

“Huh? Did you say something?”

“Nope, nothing,” Kisa shook his head. “There will be days when your schedule will be full.”

“I bet,” Takano nodded. He flipped a few pages in his notebook, highlighted some lines, then flipped the pages back and wrote some more on the still half blank page.

Kisa just opened a textbook, and spaced out again. He chewed on the corner of his lips, reading lines after lines in the book, but it didn’t really sink in his head. He just… didn’t pay attention to the world around him anymore.

Now that he thought about the possibly high number of students that probably wouldn’t seek help, he started wondering why he never did.

Why had he never seen a psychologist after Yoshida?

Probably because he couldn’t find the courage back then. How could he sit down with a complete stranger, and tell them that his lover left him without a word and a possible reason after three years of being together? How could he tell them that this lover was a guy? Because Kisa was sure that a professional would ask this, too. Or would want to know, because they would need to know.

And what would have they said? ‘Get over it, it will be alright, he probably wasn’t the right person to you’?

It would have been draining, and a pain in the arse.

 

* * *

 

Kisa yawned loudly as he was standing at the bus stop, waiting for his bus to finally arrive. He felt extremely tired, and it didn’t help that Yokozawa kept him in the office for an hour to discuss Yukimura-sensei’s absence. Apparently, she’s going to be away for a while, according to Yokozawa. And that meant that Kisa got to lecture her class, which leads to him seeing Yukina more than usual.

Yukina was one of the reasons Kisa felt tired – the fact that every time Kisa ran into him and thought it was Yoshida was extremely exhausting. Acknowledging that Yukina is not Yoshida every single day at least two times a day wasn’t exactly a fairy tale.

Kisa hated it. And god knew how long Yukimura-sensei would be away.

He just wanted this to end. He’d been having this seemingly endless pain in his chest, as if someone or something was scratching it from the inside.

When the bus arrived, Kisa hopped on and walked to the back of the vehicle, finding a seat next to the window. Before the bus departed, an old lady sat down next to him, slowly placing her little bags on the floor carefully. Kisa watched her from the corner of his eyes, then he turned his gaze towards the window to stare at the lights in the night. She was the same lady he had ran into the other day.

But then his gaze had fallen on the last person that got on the bus. He never noticed Yukina at the bus stop, and then, as he saw that he was panting, he realised that Yukina might have ran to catch the bus.

Kisa’s face went all red as he was staring at him, not being able to get his eyes off of him. Yukina didn’t notice him, though. He just sat down on a seat near the door, and the bus finally departed. Kisa slid down in his seat so Yukina wouldn’t see him.

And just then, from the corner of his eyes, Kisa saw the old woman staring at someone. Following her gaze, Kisa realised that she was staring at Yukina. Did she know him?

It has nothing to do with me, Kisa thought then. Why would he care who knows Yukina and who doesn’t?

Just a few stops later, Yukina got off the bus, and Kisa watched his every step. Weirdly enough, so did the old lady. Kisa wanted to know the reason why she was staring at Yukina all along, but he knew it was absolutely none of his business. But as the bus departed again, the old lady sat back slowly, letting out a heavy sigh.

Kisa turned towards her.

“Is everything okay?” he asked. There’s nothing wrong with asking this, is there?

“Oh yeah, don’t worry about me, young man,” the lady laughed weakly. “Just a silly old woman staring into space.”

“I’m sorry if I’m being rude, but it didn’t seem like that to me,” Kisa replied, truly concerned.

“You know...” The old lady sighed as she slowly turned to face Kisa, and Kisa felt like his heart just broke into millions of pieces. The lady’s face was sorrowful. “Sometimes the ones you love leave you. And people around you remind you of those people.”

Kisa gulped. It was now obvious that someone who was once close to this lady had passed away. Kisa didn’t say a word, just turned his gaze down. He couldn’t picture what that old lady might have felt like, he had never lost someone close to him.

“I’m sorry,” he muttered after a few seconds of silence. “I truly am.”

“Oh, young man, you don’t have to be,” the old lady smiled weakly. “It’s been years.”

Kisa slowly nodded. He still felt sad for her.

“May I ask who-”

“My son,” the lady whispered with teary eyes, and Kisa knew he shouldn’t have asked that.

“I’m sorry...”

“Don’t be,” she smiled at Kisa again. “My cheerful, beautiful son.”

Kisa smiled sadly at the old lady.

“I bet he was an amazing man, ma’am.”

Before the bus arrived at the next stop, Kisa waved bye to the old lady, and got off the bus. The lady waved through the window, and Kisa did the same, smiling. He still felt awful for her – a mother losing her child must have been the worst kind of pain.

But he couldn’t shake off the feeling that the lady was familiar.

 

* * *

 

“Good morning!”

Kisa sat down at the table with a sigh. Takano smiled at him.

“Good morning, professor.”

Kisa glanced at him, then turned his gaze back at his backpack, jut to glance at Takano again. Takano noticed him doing this, and he frowned in confusion. Kisa opened his mouth to say something, but then closed it, and Takano seemed like he was going to ask what Kisa wanted, but he didn’t. He just seemed to be waiting patiently until Kisa decided to talk.

And then Kisa did.

“Look, I’m not very good at this topic, but how do you, psychologists treat someone who’s grieving?”

Takano elbowed on the table, gently scratching his chin as he was thinking. Although he looked confused about why Kisa would suddenly ask such a thing.

“Well, there are different stages of grieve, so you probably want to find out which stage the individual is in. Denial, anger, bargain, depression, and acceptance.”

“Uhuh...”

“So,” Takano went on, “it might sound weird and half-arsed, but… we try to get the individual to develop new daily routines, set new goals for the future, so they have something to look forward to. It can help them adopt a new sense of identity. Which helps them moving on in their life without the lost one.”

Kisa nodded while thinking about the lady he talked to last night on the bus. She said it had been years since she had lost her son. Which stage she might have been in?

“Why do you ask, though? Have you lost someone?”

Kisa shook his head quickly.

“No, not at all. It’s… Sorry, it was a silly question.”

“It wasn’t,” Takano smiled. “The more you know about it, the more it increases the chance that you can help someone in need.”

Kisa nodded. Takano was right. He might need to help a student anytime.

He quickly put his notes together, and walked to his first class. He couldn’t stop thinking about that old lady and her loss, and Takano’s words. Especially, because that old lady’s son might have been extremely young when he died. The lady didn’t seem that very old herself. What if her son was Kisa’s age? Or younger? It was awful for Kisa to think about it.

He couldn’t do anything affectively that day. He was constantly spacing out while his student were taking notes, he kept stuttering, zoning out while talking, and soon enough, his students noticed him being weird. At least that’s what Kisa assumed, judging by their questioning faces, or them frowning at him.

During his last class, he was in the middle of a presentation, and he got lost mid-sentence. He tried to snap back to reality quick, and smiled at his students.

And he’d seen that Yukina was looking at him worried. Kisa slightly frowned, and Yukina smiled, then turned back to his notebook.

Kisa’s heart skipped a beat.

After class, Yukina slowly wandered towards Kisa while he was packing his stuff up. Kisa saw him coming closer from the corner of his eyes, but pretended he didn’t notice Yukina.

“Professor?”

“Yeah?”

Yukina didn’t say anything for a long moment, and Kisa lifted his glance at him. He couldn’t really read the boy’s face, but he could tell that something was off.

“Would you be interested in a coffee with me? After class or tomorrow?” Yukina finally spoke, asking his question slowly with a small smile.

Kisa had to take a moment before saying anything. His chest was aching. He didn’t want to get any closer to Yukina, but the boy kept drawing Kisa to him. Life has a weird sense of humour, Kisa thought.

“Sounds like an invitation to a date,” he said jokingly, and Yukina suddenly took a step back. Kisa was about to apologise when the boy rolled his eyes, and threw a huge grin.

“Sorry if it came off as that, I’m just quite worried about you.”

Kisa shrugged.

“You should be worried about yourself, or your friends. Not me.”

But Yukina seemed persistent.

“I’m fine. They’re fine, too. But you,” the boy pointed at Kisa, “you don’t seem fine, not a bit.”

Kisa narrowed his eyes. The whole situation was odd.

“Maybe we shouldn’t talk about it here,” he said quietly, then left the classroom, but Yukina followed him.

“So?”

Kisa sighed heavily. Maybe there would be nothing wrong with going to get a coffee with Yukina. Or maybe it would be a giant mistake.


End file.
